


Time may not heal all wounds, but pie totally does

by Swedishluck



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Baking, F/M, M/M, a surprisingly not that manipulative peter, pack bonds, peter being confused by emotions, revenge and sadness, some trust issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-01
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-30 14:50:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6428590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swedishluck/pseuds/Swedishluck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter only baked his grandmother's cherry pie for two people in his life. One of them was before the fire. After that, it took him a long time to recover, but eventually he did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Time may not heal all wounds, but pie totally does

**Author's Note:**

> This is for my self-imposed music shuffle challenge. I was bored.  
> The song for this one was Cherry Pie by Katzenjammer

Peter’s grandmother taught him her recipe for cherry pie when he turned eighteen. It was a pie she was infamous for, because while she could make other things, the pie was her best. And it was the first thing she had made for her husband back when they had just started dating.  
She told him to make it when he found someone he liked. He told her he doubted that would happen anytime soon. He was wrong.

About three years later he met Elena. She was smart, witty, and absolutely gorgeous. When she smiled, his heart felt like it had lost control.  
He asked her out, of course. He was never one to deny himself the things he wanted. But he wasn’t going to date someone uninformed, he knew that could lead to some very dangerous situations. His uncle Hank’s girlfriend had been killed by a hunter, and since then the whole family had been very careful to keep anyone they trusted enough for it informed.  
And you can’t consent to things you’re not aware of. He refused to do that to her.  
So he baked her a pie.  
While they ate it, he explained about werewolves. She took it well. Better than expected, certainly. He had been worried that she would feel betrayed, or that she wouldn’t believe him. But neither turned out to be an issue. Apparently, her aunt was a werewolf, and while she hadn’t figured out he was one before now, it wasn’t a problem to her.  
They scheduled another date, and he kissed her on the cheek before they parted ways.

They got married two years later. Seven years after that, Elena died in the fire.

When Peter woke up, he could feel the emptiness where the pack bonds used to be. But the space she occupied in his mind _ached_. It felt like it the bond had burned with her, while the others simply vanished. He couldn’t handle it. His instincts told him to make it stop, so he did what he could to make the pain end. He researched, he hunted, and he took revenge.  
  
(It wasn’t enough.)  
  
Laura came back. But she didn’t visit the hospital. She didn’t even try to come see him. And with a start, he realized that her bond had vanished with the rest of them. He broke all over again. He hadn’t even known she was alive.  
He decided to ignore her. But he ended up running into her on the next full moon anyway. She stared at him in shock, and the only thing he could do was _rage_. She had abandoned him after everything he loved had burned to ashes around him. So he killed her, and he nearly didn’t regret it (but he did, oh _he did_ , because she was family even if she wouldn’t acknowledge it herself).

When he came back to his hospital room, he laid down and thought. If she had survived, someone else could have too. There might even be some pack bonds left – he had been too focused on the pain left after Elena to really feel them.  
So he thought, he meditated, and he felt one. Derek was still there, a tiny thread that could break any moment. But he was there, and while that wasn’t nearly enough, it was _something_.  
Peter regretted killing Laura even more, now. He was afraid that Derek would find out and that the only thread, the only _bond_ , left in Peter’s head would break.

He felt a little bit saner after that, but the urge for revenge, for something to dull the burning sensation in his mind, was still there. So he continued, and the list of people that helped with the fire dwindled as he killed them off. Derek came back. He _did_ come by the hospital, staring at Peter’s comatose body in the bed, before he sighed and walked away. Peter was oddly relieved. He couldn’t handle Derek standing there, nearly crying. Not after what Peter did to Laura.

The next time he was out, there were two teenagers in the woods. And they had found the rest of his niece’s body.

He panicked and wanted to back away, to hide from these children who had seen what he left behind him, but his instincts protested. They were clearly both inquisitive and brave enough to be out in the woods where a dead body had been found, and while they were in shock and terrified they still didn’t seem that surprised that there _was_ a body, just that _they_ had found it. And he needed pack, needed someone who wouldn’t shy away from him just because of what he was, someone to keep his sanity for him when he couldn’t himself.  
So he ran forward, and he bit.  
Later, he decided he should have bitten the other one. This realization came with a clarity he hadn’t felt in years. The new pack bond seemed to have done its job, though it was weak and only there because he was the alpha and there is always a bond between the alpha and the one they turn. A pity he hadn’t seen it _before_ he turned the McCall boy. That kid was the most idealistic and naive person he had ever met, and that included Derek _before_ the fire.

But he kept going, kept taking down the people behind the fire. And then there was only Kate left.

He ended up in a parking lot with a boy whose heart screamed that he was terrified and whose sarcasm tried desperately to claim he was not. And the only thing Peter could think was _‘I should have bitten him when I had the chance’_ and the words tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them.

“Do you want the bite?”

And Stiles refused. For some reason, Peter listened. Later that night, he burned all over again.  
When he saw Stiles throwing the Molotov cocktail, he still couldn’t bring himself to regret the offer.  
(He had made sure death wouldn’t stick to him, anyway. And he knew he deserved the pain, though using fire had been a bit cruel. Still, he didn’t hold a grudge. This was his repentance for Laura.)

When he came back, crawling out of his own grave and covered in dirt, with his nephew staring horrified at him and the Martins girl looking like she wanted to throw up, he walked away.

Later, Derek found him and demanded an explanation. Peter gave it to him. Derek shouted at him about Laura. Peter flinched unwillingly. And Derek stopped. He stared at him for a moment, as if weighing the pros and cons, and then hugged him like his life depended on it.  
In that moment, Peter realized that the bond between them had never really vanished, not even after Derek killed him.  
(He couldn’t help but wonder if Derek had felt it while he was, seemingly, dead. If so, had he known that Peter wasn’t completely gone? He hadn’t thought to research that. He didn’t think it would be necessary.)  
Derek would probably never trust him fully again, but he’d never leave him. He wouldn’t have done so the first time either, but Laura looked so scared and she was _there_ , in front of him and gloriously alive and awake enough to notice him, and in the end he chose his sister over his comatose uncle.  
He never told Peter how much he regretted that. Peter guessed it anyway.

Peter started attending pack meetings. He was distrusted by the ones who had been there back then, and the new members took their cues from them.  
Stiles was rarely there, and when he was it was to help with research. Peter found this odd. Stiles refused to look at him (Peter found that far less surprising, but it still hurt).

Peter ignored the fact that he was steadily becoming obsessed with the boy, and kept watching him. And what he saw made him furious. The pack was ignoring him, shutting him out, and if there was one thing that was important above all others to Peter, it was pack. Doing this to any of them, denying their rights to join in with their opinions and suggestions, was _unthinkable_.  
But Peter didn’t want to say anything, didn’t want the frail pack bonds that had started forming despite the mistrust to break. Didn’t want Derek to leave him behind again, even if he knew his nephew would never do that. It was illogical, but he didn’t say anything, even when his instincts _screamed_ at him to help.  
Instead he simply started paying even more attention to Stiles, looking for what makes him tense up, what makes him flinch and his eyes screw up as if in pain even though it’s just words. And then he avoided doing any of it. The least he could do was make sure he wouldn’t hurt the boy more than he already had, and change the subject when someone said something stupid or downright hurtful.  
The first time he did so, Stiles turned around and stared at him in surprise, and it’s the first time he’d even looked at him since he came back from the dead.  
Peter felt like smiling.

A few weeks later, Stiles had started watching him back. Mostly when he thought Peter wouldn’t notice. And when Peter said something especially sarcastic and vicious about one of Derek’s plans, Stiles would add something equally witty. Peter decided that counted as progress. The boy needed to know not everyone would shut him out. He’s _pack_ , not that Peter ever said that out loud. Not yet. Not at this point. Peter’s still too scared that he’ll lose it again.

There was a fight. Of course there was a fight, it had been far too quiet lately and this was _Beacon Hills_ , nothing ever stays calm there.  
A group of hunters came into town. They refused to talk. They just attacked, and Erica got a bullet in her leg and Lydia got a nasty gash in her arm that would definitely scar and another bullet went flying towards Stiles so fast that Peter almost didn’t have time to react and then he’s on the ground, three meters from where he was and _screaming_ , and there’s blood and too much pain to handle and then he passed out.

When he woke up, Stiles was sitting at his bedside and the pain was gone. The boy fiddled with a phone and kept frowning at it like it had personally offended him. Or maybe like someone just sent him a picture of a turkey in a bikini and he’s confused as hell. It’s difficult to tell. Peter lifted his head slightly to see if someone really did send something like that, but the screen seemed to be black. His movement must have alerted Stiles though, because suddenly that frown was directed at him. And he saw that yes, that frown was definitely of the confused kind, because there’s something utterly helpless and unsure about those eyes. Peter wondered what could have caused it.  
Then Stiles opened his mouth and Peter braces himself for a rush of words, something to explain what was happening and what Stiles was doing by his bedside and why his expression had gone so open and confused and lost. But the only thing Stiles said is “Why?” and Peter had no idea what was being asked. So he said so.  
Stiles looked surprised, like he expected Peter to understand what he meant instantly, and Peter couldn’t decide if he felt smug or scared out of his mind at that thought. Because the last person to look at him like that, in a way that wasn’t condescending or disappointed, was Elena.  
He glanced at Stiles again, and settled for both.  
While waiting for Stiles to rephrase the question, he looked around the room. Ah. Deaton’s. He looked back at Stiles, and silently continued waiting. After a short moment of them staring at each other, Stiles spoke again.  


“Why did you take a bullet for me?”  
  
Peter blinked. He thought that would be obvious. He did it because the boy is _pack_ , and Peter protects his pack members fiercely and with no regrets. He opened his mouth to say this, and-

-the words got stuck in his throat. They’re true, but if that was the only reason, he would’ve done the same for Erica first. He would have stopped that hunter from cutting Lydia. He would have been in the middle of the battle instead of standing at the edge and only participating when a hunter came near him or when he saw Derek in danger. He would’ve protected someone other than his nephew and _Stiles_.

Peter stared at Stiles, utterly terrified, because this boy, this _child_ who wields sarcasm and a baseball bat with equal skill (decent, but not enough to have much effect if it wasn’t for the sheer enthusiasm thrown into it), who is gangly limbs and pale skin dotted with moles and a mind as beautiful as his Elena, had somehow become as important to him as his only remaining family.  
But Stiles was still waiting for an answer, and Peter didn’t know what to tell him. So he went with the first thing that came to mind.

“Why not?”

A moment later, he felt stupid. But really, he was a bit too distracted to come up with a good answer.  
Stiles just blinked and glared at him, as if waiting for a real answer. Peter raised an eyebrow and looked at him evenly until the boy stopped glaring and went back to giving him that lost look again. When Peter still didn’t say anything more, he gave a frustrated snort and stood up to leave.  
When Stiles started to head for the door, Peter relaxed. He really didn’t want that line of questioning to continue. He wasn’t entirely sure what the answer would be, in the end.  
Then Stiles turned around for a moment, and gave him a look that clearly said ‘ _this isn’t over’_. Peter glanced away. When he looked back, Stiles was gone.

Derek came in later, with Deaton following him. They told him he’s fine to go, after a brief check by Deaton to see if his wound was fully healed and a worried glance from Derek, and Peter headed back to his apartment. He needed to think.

A week later, Stiles woke up to a cherry pie and an invitation sitting innocently on his kitchen table. 


End file.
